Slow and Steady Rush (30 page)

“I’m glad you called me.”

“Come and eat.” Their back and forth was unnatural and stilted. The ease they’d shared seemed lost forever. It was as if two precious things had died.

The four of them reminisced about Ada while Logan and Robbie ate. Kat shooed the men home. Logan hugged her again before tramping down the steps to his truck. Robbie and Avery left with nothing but a glance in Darcy’s direction.

The only TV was in the den where Ada’s empty bed sat. The implication didn’t bother Kat in the least. She changed the sheets and patted the space next to her. Darcy climbed up, her heart skipping, but the very act of claiming the space banished the ghosts. Instead, it was almost as if Ada were there cackling along with them and making lewd comments.

The movie over, they lay side by side and stared up at the ceiling beams. “I’m going to miss her too,” Kat whispered. “I’ll need to sit with you and Logan and go over her will.”

Darcy turned her face into a pillow that still held the faint scent of Ada’s lotion. “Surely, it’s pretty straightforward.”

“You might be surprised.” Before Darcy could pump her for more information, she said, “Sheila’s off to rehab.”

“I hope she finds a way to be happy.”

“That’s rather big of you considering she was behind all the rumors and the attack on Dalt.” Kat turned her head so they were nearly nose-to-nose.

“I think she hates herself more than she hates me or Robbie or even her husband.”

“You’ve changed,” Kat said with a frown.

“In a good way or a bad way?”

“You’re being all mature and stuff. I’m impressed.”

Darcy elbowed Kat in the ribs. “Talk about maturing … the town council offered me a job running the library.”

Kat popped up on an elbow to look down at her. “What’d you tell them?”

“Told them I needed to think it over.”

“What about Dalt?”

“I screwed the pooch with Robbie. I told him I loved him, and he panicked.”

Kat flopped to her back. “Men are idiots. But he left Avery here to watch over you. In the world according to Dalt, I’d say that’s love.”

Maybe it was, but Darcy needed more. “I’m going to wait until after the funeral to decide anything. There will be decisions to make about the houses and land.”

Kat tensed beside her but only yawned. “I’m ready for bed. Want to move the party to your room?”

They lay side by side in her brass bed and talked until the moon was high. Kat surrendered to sleep first. Her eyes heavy, but her mind whirling, Darcy thought about how many nights over the years, they’d fallen asleep like this. She was thankful for Kat but longed for Robbie. The world was a different place than it had been twenty-four hours ago. A lonelier place.

Chapter 23

Steel gray clouds chased away the warm fall days they had been enjoying. A blustery north wind stripped leaves from trees, scattering them through the graveyard. Orange, red, and yellow covered the browning grass.

Robbie’s palm itched from where he stood at the back of the crowd. Darcy wiped the tears off her splotchy face with the back of her hand while Logan’s arm circled her shoulders. Robbie wanted to be the one Darcy leaned on, but he’d vowed to keep his distance until he could make the break.

With Miss Ada gone, Darcy might make the break for him. Had she started packing? His heart constricted, and he backed away as the service broke up, deciding to walk the few blocks from the cemetery to the football complex. They’d won their last game, and the playoffs loomed. Maybe work would keep his mind off her.

“Coach! Wait up.”

He turned and waited for Kat. Dressed all in black with a small, veiled hat perched on her curls, she looked like she’d stepped off a movie set.

“Listen, I need to talk to you about—”

“I don’t want to talk about Darcy,” he said forcefully as he veered onto Main Street.

Kat matched his long stride, even managing to throw him a smirk and raised eyebrow. “Actually, that’s not what I need to discuss, but it sounds like you have some things on your mind. Might be best to share them with our girl.”

Our
girl. But for how long?

“Right this way.” The red fingernails digging into his arm forced him to a stop outside of her office on Main Street. She opened the door and waved him inside. “This is business. Head on back and grab some coffee if you want.” He imagined she interrogated criminals in the same no-nonsense tone.

A half-hour later, he emerged in a daze. In her will, Miss Ada had given him the option to buy the Wilson house for a ridiculously low price. His afternoon classes passed in a blur.

Finally, after practice, he listened to his messages. Local reporters, well-wishes from prominent townspeople, the mayor included, a call from the bank letting him know to come in at his convenience to set up the mortgage.

He cleaned up and headed home.
Home
. It took on a new meaning. For the first time since Miss Ada passed, Darcy’s car was the only one out front. In the falling gloom, the porch swing rocked but not from the wind. A small figure huddled. Her pain seeped into the night. His heart hurt because she hurt and, right or wrong, he had to hold her, comfort her, alleviate her pain.

He rolled to a stop outside Miss Ada’s house. The engine sputtered off, leaving a heavy silence. Even the crickets had gone into mourning. As Avery went in search of his favorite rose bush, Robbie walked to the porch and up the steps, one overly loud clomp at a time.

An old afghan blanket was wrapped around her legs. The gray sweater from the funeral showed at the top. Before he could say a word, she pounced. Her arms weaved around his neck, and her body melded with his, their lips colliding with bruising intensity. The honeysuckle of her hair wove a summer spell around them in spite of the chill.

The days without her had been interminable, the nights lonely. He held her head while his tongue dipped between her lips. She grappled along his shoulders, pulling and tugging, but he didn’t release her face to allow more intimate contact. He’d missed her. Missed her with an intensity that brought the sting of tears to his eyes.

She skimmed hands down his flanks. The ripple of pleasure tensed his muscles. His tongue curled deeper into her mouth, and her answering moan reverberated through his chest, tightening it with need. She ripped at his belt and the fly of his jeans.

She delved into his boxer briefs, pushing them down. The cool evening air couldn’t dent his arousal. He glided his hands down her body, over her breasts, briefly cupping her ass, to the hem of her skirt. Her legs were bare, the dark tights she’d worn earlier gone.

While nipping her upper lip between his teeth, he tugged the skirt up to bunch at her waist, grasped her thighs, and lifted. Her knees pressed into his hips. Her panty-covered crotch pressed tight against his bare erection.

He didn’t go far. Shuffling, he sat on the swing and positioned her legs on either side of his thighs. Little encouragement from him was required. She fisted her hands in the cloth at his shoulders and writhed. Her head thrown back and her eyes closed, he was only an instrument for her pleasure.

The wet satin of her panties rasped erotically against his erection as her hips worked. He needed more, and from her frustrated cry, she needed more too. He hooked his trembling fingers around the delicate fabric of her panties and forced them to the side. Slipping his pants down farther, he exposed every inch of his aching dick.

She took advantage of the entire length and worked him like a wild woman. He pushed up her sweater. The cups of her black lace bra barely covered her pebbled nipples. He fixed that deficiency until her nipples were on full display. His licks and sucks drew the buds tight. With her breasts exposed and her body flushed, she made the most erotic picture he could imagine.

He desperately wanted to see her come like this, riding him like her survival depended on a climax. She keened to the night. Grabbing her hips, he forced her undulation against him to continue, growing slick.

He maneuvered her lax body up, and his length disappeared into her tight hold. Once seated, she took control again, rising and falling with faster and faster intent. Apparently, her intention was to make him come as quickly as possible. He watched where they joined, watched the flex of her muscles, watched her swollen folds engulf him over and over.

He grabbed her hips and slammed her down a half dozen times. With one final thrust, he came, his body shuddering. He pulled her onto his chest. Still semi-hard inside of her, he was in no hurry to move.

He ran his hands along her bare legs, and she shivered. Goose pimples marred the smooth skin. Reluctantly, he stood and set her in front of him. She tugged her sweater and skirt down, and he pulled his pants up.

Neither one of them had said a word.

His voice rasped unnaturally in the darkness. “Darcy, I—”

She shushed him. Uncertainty struck. She made the decision for him, taking his hand and pulling him inside. He followed like a dog while Avery loped to the kitchen.

As soon as they crossed the threshold of her room, she kicked the door shut, and he let her push him against it, finding her abandon arousing. Blood re-gathered in his dick.

His shirt flew across the room to hang from the corner of the mirror. He’d pulled his pants up, not fastened them. She pushed them to his ankles, and he kicked them off. Her hands roved his chest, and her fingers pinched his nipples.

Her sweater got the same treatment as his shirt, but he left her bra in place, enjoying the decadence. He unclasped her skirt and pushed it and her panties to the floor.

“How do you want it?” he whispered in her ear.

“I want it rough. Make me feel something besides sad.”

He spun her and forced her hands to the cold post of the brass bed. She faced the mirror. Sliding his erection along the crack of her ass, his fingers played. One hand teased her nipples while the other played in her wet folds.

“Talk to me, Robbie.” She moaned as two of his fingers filled her.

He whispered every dirty word in his vocabulary, describing what he wanted to do to her in vivid detail. She rocked on his fingers. Her hair billowed down her back. His hand left her breast to wind a swath of her hair around his palm. He tugged. She gasped and stood taller.

He couldn’t take his eyes off her reflection. Her jutting breasts bobbed in time to her body’s thrusts onto his fingers. In the darkness, she was shades of gray, but red heat radiated off her body.

“Look at yourself.” He barely recognized his guttural voice.

She did. Their gazes collided in the mirror. One of her hands left the bedpost to settle on her breast. He rubbed her with a singular goal. Her head fell back to his shoulder, and strands of her hair caressed the tip of his erection. A trembling spread through her body. She cried his name and convulsed around his fingers.

The sight of her absolute surrender to the passion flaring between them pushed him over the edge. He slammed inside of her, any pretense of gentleness out of his reach. The force of his body drove her over the mattress. He pounded. She didn’t shy away but popped her ass higher in the air.

When he came, his knees buckled, and he collapsed on top of her, driving them both facedown on the bed. Spikes of pleasure curled his toes. Eventually, his jellylike muscles regained strength, and he scooted to the pillows, pulling her up next to him. She cuddled against his sweat-dampened, heaving chest, and they gusted nearly identical sighs.

The part of him that wondered if maybe she loved him enough to accept his past urged him to speak, to confess, to beg, but while he had learned to control his anger, his fear was an untamed monster that stole his confidence. He kept his mouth shut and squeezed his eyes closed.

He woke an hour before dawn, lost for a few heartbeats. The scent of sex hung around him, beckoning memories. The white skin of her back was a beacon. He wanted to glide his fingertips from the base of her neck to the top of her buttocks. He wanted to take her again and this time whisper sweet promises.

Instead, he shifted to the edge of the bed, moving as if hunting—softly, soundlessly. Gathering his clothes, he padded to the hall to dress. The telling step creaked on his way down. He froze, but no door opened, no outraged feminine voice sounded.

The click of dog nails on the wood floors drew him farther down. Without putting his boots on, he and Avery retreated.

#

She stared at the wall. The click of the front door sounded like it was a foot away. So loud. So final. What did it mean that he’d left her? Had her unleashed need disgusted him? No, definitely not disgusted, he’d enjoyed himself. The evidence was on her legs, her sore scalp where he’d pulled at her hair, even the twinge between her thighs. She’d hoped his appearance meant he’d decided to take a chance on her, on them.

Her mind spun useless circles around the problem of Robbie. Frustrated with her inability to figure the man out, she rose and brewed coffee. Logan and Kat would be by soon to discuss Ada’s will. Another set of worries grew. Kat had been unusually evasive about the subject.

Promptly at ten, Kat let herself in the kitchen door, heels tapping. Darcy met her before she made it to the swinging door. Dressed like a lawyer and pushing six feet in the red-bottomed heels, Kat looked intimidating.

Her voice was more formal than usual. “Let’s sit at the kitchen table, shall we?”

Darcy eyed her like a stranger. “You’re scaring me. What’s wrong?”

A sigh diminished the tension holding Kat so still and upright. She collapsed in the chair, her legs splaying like a child. “I’m afraid you’re not going to like what I have to show you.”

Truck tires crunched gravel. The two friends stared at each other, silent and waiting. Logan dragged in. The late night and stressful emotional week had taken a toll. His hair was disheveled, his brown eyes muddy. Without offering a greeting, he poured a mug of black coffee and slid in beside Darcy, briefly passing his hand over hers.

“Now that the pertinent parties have assembled, we can begin.” Kat had put her professional hat on but with an anxious undercurrent.